Hunger Heroes School Challenge

Your School Can Make A Difference!

The Hunger Hero School Challenge is a fun and engaging way for students to fight hunger in our community.

School pride and competitive spirit extends beyond the schoolhouse walls. This is why Gleaners is calling upon area schools to channel their school spirit into activism by participating in the Hunger Hero School Challenge.

More than 700,000 southeast Michigan residents, including one in four children, are faced with the uncertainty of where their next meal will come from. With the help of our Hunger Hero partners, Gleaners aims to distribute more than 100,000 meals per day in 2014-2015.

Your school can make a big difference for hungry neighbors. By pledging to collect four cans (or other nonperishable food items) per student, each student can feed one person for one day. Or, provide a day’s worth of food with just $1!

Each month, schools will participate in a friendly competition to provide the most meals per student. Top schools will win pizza parties, bagel breakfasts or great prizes from the Plymouth Whalers Hockey Organization.

Getting Started

Create a Timeline: Choose the length of the food drive (one to two
weeks is best), get materials, educate your committee, , identify collections
sites and divide up tasks. Consider holding a food drive in non-holiday months
when donated food is in short supply.

Set Your Goals: Set them high at 1,000 lbs or more. You’ll be surprised how
easy it is to get there! One canned food
item or dried box of food = 1 pound.
One dollar = 4 pounds.

Promote the Food Drive: Make your 1,000 pound goal known to students and
parents! Increase awareness on hunger and nutrition in your school. Provide an
in-school incentive for kids to bring food such as no homework for an evening,
extra credit, or try to fill the
Principal’s office with food!

Remind and Excite Participants: Whether your food drive is 4 days or 14 days, you
need to keep the momentum going. Update students on the drive’s progress.
Create a thermometer to track it visually.

Celebrate a Successful Food Drive: Be sure to communicate back to your school how much food and
how many meals were collected, and celebrate the success!